With the ever increasing connectivity of our lives, having a reliable cable verifier is becoming a minimum for technicians. Ideal Industries have introduced a new line of VDV testers and promise that they are more than just a wire mapper. Today I will be taking a look the Ideal R158002 VDV II Plus VDV Cable Fault Tester and going over the features and specifications.

First things first, let’s start with a few general features of this product. In keeping up with other manufacturers in other businesses entirely, the packaging and design of this unit has been given plenty of thought. The packaging is aesthetically pleasing and the meter itself has a nice feel to it and a pleasant color scheme. The device itself has a simple look giving it an easy to use feel and a large 2.9” backlit display. The remote also stores nicely in the bottom of the unit keeping it protected when not in use. The VDV II Plus also includes a carrying case that includes a few adapters and patch cables.

As for the types of testing you can do, let’s break it down. The Ideal R158002 VDV II Plus VDV Cable Fault Tester measures Coax, 6 Pin, and 8 Pin copper cables. As expected this unit can do your basic wire mapping which includes split pairs, shorts, opens and crossover. There is also a built in analog tone generator that can be used with most tone probes to trace or find a wire in a bundle. There is also a voltage protection feature that will disable cable testing if more than 2V of non-standard voltage is detected. The R158002 VDV II Plus is capable of blinking a Hub to see where it is connected and also finds cable length and distances to opens.

If wire mapping and cable testing is your business, the Ideal R158002 VDV II Plus VDV Cable Fault Tester is definitely worth checking out. What feature do you find to be most exciting that your current tester does not do that you need?